Magazine-type record player

ABSTRACT

A record player in which a magazine is provided with compartments for storing a number of rigid and flexible disk-shaped recording media. For playing the disks, they are removed only to an extent necessary for the disk drive to engage bores of the disk. Each compartment has a bottom with a semi-circular recess at a side of the magazine from which the recording media are removed for being played. This recess has a diameter that is substantially longer than the diameter of the respective disk to be played, so that the disk can rotate freely while being played. Each compartment, furthermore, as a storage recess above the semi-circular recess for storing the disk. To play the disk, the latter is lowered from the storage recess into the semi-circular recess, but the lowering of the disk is such that the disk will not contact the bottom of the semi-circular recess, so as to allow free rotation of the disk within the semi-circular recess.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

The invention concerns a magazine-type record player with compartments that can accommodate several disk-shaped recording media and with a mechanism for removing the disk-shaped recording media from the compartments in the magazine.

Record players of this type include for example compact-disk players or videodisk players as well as computers that employ storage devices in the form of disk-shaped recording media. With known compact-disk players, a mechanism completely removes from the magazine the disk that is to be played and positions it on the disk-drive mechanism. Once it has been played, the disk is thrust back into the compartment provided for it.

One essential drawback of this type of compact-disk player is that the magazine takes up a lot of space, and this is a special problem for players installed in vehicles because the instrument panel does not have much room for the radio, the cassette recorder, and a compact-disk player.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The object of the invention is accordingly to improve a magazine-type record player to the extent that it will take up little space.

This object is attained in accordance with the invention in that a disk-shaped recording medium that is to be played is removed from the magazine only to the extent that the disk-drive mechanism can engage the bore in the medium.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 illustrates the optical scanner, the disk-drive mechanism, and the magazine of a compact-disk player in accordance with the invention and

FIG. 2 illustrates one compartment in the magazine.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

FIG. 1 shows how a compact disk P is played. It is removed from a magazine M only far enough for a disk-drive mechanism A to engage the bore B in the disk. An optical scanning system O reads out the data stored in the spiral tracks on the disk.

Removing compact disk P from magazine M only partly instead of completely saves a lot of space. It also takes considerably less time to remove a disk from the magazine and thrust it back in.

FIG. 2 illustrates an especially practical embodiment of the invention with a semicircular recess K in the floor of each compartment in magazine M. The diameter of recess K is slightly longer than the outer diameter of the disks. Compact disk P is precisely centered in recess K while being played. The advantage of the recess is that each compartment in magazine M can be lowered from floor to roof because the recess allows the disk to rotate freely. The decrease in height of each compartment in turn makes the magazine as a whole lower from top to bottom, saving even more space.

The invention is in no way limited to compact-disk players but is appropriate for any equipment that reads information from a disk-shaped recording medium whether the scanner is in contact with the medium or not. 

I claim:
 1. A record player comprising: a magazine having compartments for storing a plurality of rigid and flexible disk-shaped recording media; means for removing said disk-shaped recording media one at a time from said compartments in said magazine; disk drive means for engaging a bore in each of said recording media to play said recording media; said recording media being removable one at a time by said removing means to a minimum position necessary to expose said bore of a recording medium for engagement with said disk drive means; said compartments extending to an open side of said magazine from which said recording media are removed; each of said compartments having a floor with a semi-circular recess at said open side of said magazine; said recess therein having a diameter substantially longer than an outer diameter of a respective disk-shaped recording medium so that said recording medium can rotate freely while being player; each of said compartments having a storage recess above said semi-circular recess for fully storing said recording medium; said removing means lowering the medium to be played from said storage recess into said semi-circular recess for playing the recording medium, said recording medium being freely rotatable within said semi-circular recess after being lowered into said semi-circular recess. 